Thursday 12 March 2009

All Business is Show Business

Yesterday, I went with my wife and some friends to sit in the audience for the recording of this week's Graham Norton TV Show. Now, at one level there is nothing more shallow than a celebrity based, light entertainment chat show. It's fun for the half hour on TV, then it's forgotten. But there are ideas that we can take and use in our own business.

1.Don't Be Boring
OK, if you are a brain surgeon and I need a life saving operation, I wouldn't expect you to be cracking one-liners. But you are not a brain surgeon, are you? If you are, why are you reading my blog? However, one of the biggest mistakes you can make is to be too earnest and bore your constituency. As Scott McKain wrote “All business is show business”.

2.How do you do it?
Be yourself and let your personality come through. You have a personality that your friends and family see. Start showing up and let it out. It's OK to play with your constituency, have some fun this is business after all, you're not trying to save mankind.

3.Free, Free, Free then Fee
You can go to the Graham Norton TV Show for free, you can watch his TV show almost for free on the BBC, you can watch his material for free on the BBC website and YouTube. And those people who access all his free stuff and are then likely to shell out £50 per ticket to go and see him perform in the West End. Adopt the free, free, free and then fee model. Hint: start a blog!

4.Become a your own Media Channel.
But Rod, Graham Norton has the resources of the BBC behind him, how could I do that? The internet has made us all media people. You can interview celebrities and personalities in your industry in a blog, on a podcast, on video. Come on, if I can do this, so can you. Most people are flattered to be asked for an interview especially from you, as you're not some hack looking to carry out a hatchet job.

You might never win a BAFTA, but that is not your goal. Your goal is to stand out and have your constituency welcome your stuff. If I can do it, so can you.

If you want to see what happened on the Graham Norton TV Show, tune in at 10pm tonight on BBC2 or catch it online. I'm the guy in the red lumberjack shirt.

2 comments:

Jeremy Jacobs said...

Start a blog is a great thing to do. I've captured lots of business and kudos from Jeremy Jacobs and at Corporate Presenter

Good luck with this Rod.

Anonymous said...

Excellent reference to free, free, free and then fee. Blogs and article writing are the way to do it, followed up by teleseminars, workshops, e-books and e-courses. And of course speaking at events will eventually arise in being paid for it - at least I hope so! And don't forget the power of social networking to make more noise in your favour.